The Under-16 player, who features regularly in youth games at older age levels, has already been offered a professional contract at St Mary's.

But the highly rated youngster is yet to make a decision regarding his future and the Gunners are now poised to raid one of the top academies in English football which has nurtured the likes of Gareth Bale, Theo Walcott and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain.

Saints are desperate to keep Slattery, who will have to decide whether to take his chances of eventually making the first team at Arsenal or staying put on the south coast and emulating the likes of Adam Lallana, Luke Shaw, James Ward-Prowse and Callum Chambers.

The teenager would cost Arsenal a fee at a tribunal should he decide to leave St Mary's.

But the overall cost could still represent a bargain for the north Londoners if Slattery progresses to the level of a number of recent Southampton youth products.